And here we are at Day Five of the Week of Happy! Today I wanted to just kinda celebrate my favorite kind of “solid” or “non-solid-solid” as it were. True these are mostly prints, but compared to other prints I use, they are very calm and settling. Particularly Violet Craft’s little birds....I just LOVE these. All of these fabrics are from Michael Miller and the little birds on the right are Violet’s design. The prints above the tiny houndstooth and the large houndstooth on the left are from Patty Sloniger’s line, Emma’s Garden.

And of course more treat bags ...... I made 100 of these suckers…...I wanted to make sure that all of my students at Quilters Affair got a little treat….a thank you from me for selecting my classes.

So totally digging this tiny houndstooth as a basic!!

So here’s the surprise package (not so much of a surprise now!) that I have been referring to all week as the second prize in the Week of Happy. A whole bunch of stuff from Spring Quilt Market and a few things from the Sisters Outdoor Quilt Show in Sisters, Oregon. So comment about what makes you happy on every day of the Week of Happy and some time on this coming Monday morning, I will pull two winners from all of the comments. One winner for this package and one winner for the Chronicle Books package (read about that prize on Day One of Happy).

And again, I have been loving hearing what is making you Happy this week….Helps me to maintain a bit of Happy in my life too!!

So June is here…..and a flood of stuff will be showing up here on the blog. I will be having a couple of giveaways, telling you about my first set of patterns finally up for sale on my new Etsy shop, new books by friends, a whole bunch of mostly) new lines of fabrics by some very dear friends of mine and a whole lot more.

I stopped by to visit with my friends Sara and Julie the other day (check all of the other visits out too, Sara is hosting a bunch of reviews on Julie’s patterns and rulers)......okay Virtually stopped by, whatever…..that’s where I talked about the above runners made with Julie’s Seaside pattern. But today here is where I am going to give one of them away…..Just the top, you will have to quilt it yourself….but at least the piecing is all done.

I also wanted to show you all of these little bags I made with a lot of the Jelly Roll leftovers. I can’t believe how much fabric was in that Jelly Roll!!

All of the fabric in these projects were from one yard a jelly roll of Joanna’s new line Mirabelle (with the exception of that one fleur de lis stripe cream and tan print in the lining of that middle bag [and a few more]. That print is an older Michael Miller print). I am making a TON of these bags that will hopefully be filled with goodies from my many industry friends for giving away at Quilt Market and Quilters’ Affair coming soon.

So back to the giveaway. Since this line reminds me so much of Peach Cobbler, leave a comment about your favorite fruit or fruit concoction or any story regarding fruit. I will draw a name sometime this weekend and send the winner one of the runner tops above. As I mentioned above the winner will have to quilt and bind it, but the piecing is all done for you.

And I have to get back to sewing and writing. I am almost caught up on my sewing, but my writing is SOOOO far behind. (and those of you waiting for the Quilters’ Affair patterns that I was going to have done months ago, I am eternally grateful for your patience. I am getting close to having them ready, but they are still not quite there….you are awesome for being so graciously waiting for them!) (And this simple little post took freaking forever to get done…programs acting up etc…I need a faster computer…or I need to clean this one out {that is probably very true!})

I know this line has been out awhile, but I still wanted to share the joy of it with you. It is called Sitting Pretty by Laurie Wisbrun for Robert Kaufman Fabrics. And I also had this charm pack of Kona Solids from Robert Kaufman lying around. I was thinking what could I do with them, and then it hit me. ...

I could make my favorite little treat bags designed by my friend Monica. So I did….I made a lot. I have a couple of big events coming up that I would love to give away goodies, so I decided I would just make up a few bags from each new line when they come in so I would always have a few on hand. I modified Monica’s pattern a bit so that I could more efficiently incorporate the charm squares.

And fittingly enough, you could use them for Easter. Tonight, tomorrow whatever. Now that your taxes are done, you might as well make some of these before the weekend!

They are addictive, I tell you…...well, not as addictive as Cadbury Mini Eggs….but close….really close….

My next post will have some more of these handy dandy little bags…..AND a great giveaway!! So come back soon, you hear?

Charley and Birch, sounds like a brand name, doesn’t it? Maybe for some hot indie fashion house, right? Well in a way it is a “brand” of sorts, more of a merging of two great entities, Charley Harper designs printed by Birch Fabric on organic cotton fabric. Pretty much a win-win in my book! The first time I remember hearing about Charley Harper was when my friend John sent me a little wall calendar one year. It was a great introduction. I love the clean graphic interpretation of the natural world. Since then I have seen his work in many spots. I wonder if it was always there, but I just wasn’t paying attention to it.

I know this line came out last fall, and yes, it is part of my massive catch-up run I am trying to work on. But I still think it is great news, and I wanted to share it with you.

I love the mustards and blues in this line…and this “panel” piece…..some of these will make PERFECT labels, right??

To show how they intermingle in a block I have made two more of my Maple Leaf blocks.

That’s it for today. Have a happy spring (in the northern hemisphere at least

Scrumptious, isn’t it? Lots of layers, my favorite thing in prints. The hand of the fabric is nice to work with too.

So to show off how the prints play nice with each other, I did what any normal and sane quilter would do. I cut up those big chunks of fabric into smaller chunks of fabric and sewed them back together again with some “solids” from the Blue Nickel stockpile stash. More Maple Leaf blocks of course.

That’s it for today. I have more to catch up on, so the next few posts may be short but sweet, and of course, I will have pix to make your day brighter.

Have you heard of Megan Frock? By now, I bet more of you have, but just in case you haven’t I want to share with you something wonderful Megan worked on for quite awhile under the radar, and brought to the light of day last summer or fall I think. (or heaven help me if I forgot, last spring??)

Megan sent me her wonderful book late last year….so bad of me, I don’t remember when….I loved it from the start, but like many, many things it fell behind the wake of my other adventures….which is no indication of it’s greatness to be sure.

I first met Megan when she was helping out our mutual friend Tula Pink at one Market. I barely spoke to her at the first one, I think I was crazy busy, and I think Megan was a bit overwhelmed by the amazingness of the whole event. But at the last few Markets, I have had the opportunity to chat with Megan, and I tell you that each conversation is a treat in true Southern charm. Her accent is just delightful and her love of the craft it just as sweet.

the hand embroidered haven is Megan’s first book (I am sure she will have more!) and it is chock full of some great sewing projects with an emphasis on embroidery as a featured part of each project.

I can particularly relate to the Rabbit Ears on the TV…..had those all of the time growing up…We could only get three stations, sometimes we were lucky enough to get the fourth station from the border of Washington State and Canada.

And Megan also has some great instructions for stitches…including some I had never heard of but sound compelling. Like the Couched Filling Stitch.

And Twilling…I am sure I have seen this, but never knew what it was called. Love the full texture it brings to the needlework.

But as you know already, I rarely get to carving out the time to embroider. So of course my first loves in her book were the quilts and these two are my favorites!

So that’s it for today. If you don’t already have Megan’s book, go right out and get it. You’ll be happy you did!

Oh, and the fabric behind all of these shots? Beauty Queen from Jennifer Paganelli for Free Spirit. New this Spring. Look for it, You’ll love it!

As in previous posts here at the Blue Nickel, the game works like this: Check out these pictures and previous shots here, here, and here. Then make your best guess as to what is in the center of the quilt Dave designed and I pieced (quilted by my friend Becky Marshall).

Make your guesses on the Free Spirit Facebook page at anyone of the posts there regarding this quilt mystery game. The big reveal post will be here on Friday the 17th of May! There have been some great guesses!! Can’t wait to see the next batch of guesses!!

As this post goes up….I am in the throes of last minute packing and getting things ready for Market and trying to make sure the house will be maintained and all the other “stuff” that happens when you leave the house with kids in charge….

Don’t forget to check out the blog Friday and Saturday for some great “surprise” posts regarding some of the projects I have been working on for Market…and then there will be more after too because I just don’t have time to get them all up before!

So the folks over at Free Spirit wanted to have some fun with Dave’s new World Tour line in conjunction with the quilt that I am wrapping up for them. The quilt was designed by the fabulous Mr. B, and has a really unique feel to it, well branded into his Parson Gray aesthetic. The center of this quilt has something in the center that the Free Spirit peeps thought it would be fun for you to guess what it is…...AND give you a cool prize to boot!

Here’s the deets:

For the next few weeks before Quilt Market, I am going to be posting some successively “revealing” photos of the quilt here on my blog, and then you get to go over and make comments on Free Spirit’s Facebook page guessing what is in the center of the quilt. Each post will reveal a bit more about the quilt, and on the Friday of Market, you will get to see the full thing here at the Blue Nickel, if you aren’t already down in Portland, Oregon for Market. If you have the correct answer to the mysterious center of the quilt, then you will be put in a drawing for a fabulous gift package from Free Spirit!

So go ahead make your guesses over on Free Spirit’s Facebook page on this link.

Once again I get to play with David Butler’s newest line for Free Spirit. This one is called World Tour, and yup…it’s his best yet!

The first thing that I noticed and absolutely love in this mix is the printed linen!! First, it is just a bit thicker than the regular quilting cotton, but much more “substantial”. And the drape and hand of this linen is just incredible! It is perfect for bags and lightweight jackets, etc. I am thinking about getting a vest made out of it, but not sure if I will have time before Market which is when I want it for.

Each print is named after places around the globe, from Fiji to Canterbury to Osaka to Kashmir and they go great with his past lines. I am sure they will also play well with others even though I haven’t had much of a chance to do that yet.

The quilt that I am making for Market is David’s design, and you are going to love it! I am not allowed to show the full thing here yet, you are just seeing pieces of it today…...... I will post a photo of it here while I am at Market. It is great for those guys in your life! Very Dude-sanctioned!!

But I did have scraps, and you know how I can’t throw out any scraps! So I have been playing with this “planned” improv piece tonight while the World Tour quilt is at the quilter’s, and I am waiting for the other fabrics for three other Quilt Market projects to get here.

Not sure where this is going, but this is where it is starting from. I am thinking more and more that this one is going to be named Reykjavik.I added some hot pink solid I had floating around, and I have some Curious Nature prints in mind as well as this red/burgundy Ombre from my stash by Blank Quilting

I have similar plans to do this with some Glimma from Windham fabrics that have been here in the studio for awhile that I have been wanting to feature…..and actually I had drawn up this idea for Glimma first…..but I had all these half-square triangles and skinny strips from fussy-cutting…..and well, a man’s gotta do what a man’s gotta do…..